Monday, March 27, 2017

There was yet another track for the
Minneapolis Energy Options campaign in full swing by late February / early
March of 2013. It was for the Minneapolis Energy Options resolution to win the
endorsement of the Minneapolis DFL. The campaign had easily won the endorsement
of the Minneapolis Green Party in February 2013. While Minneapolis Energy
Options itself is not a partisan entity, we encouraged any possible engaged,
informed and motivated base to attend all DFL conventions and ward caucuses
with the end goal of getting Minneapolis Energy Options endorsed by the city
DFL.

The
work toward that goal began in late February with calling and recruiting
potential delegates to read the resolution at their DFL precinct caucuses.The resolution was to
put a ballot question up for voters authorizing Minneapolis to “research,
explore and pursue the option of converting our energy utilities to city
ownership, if such a transition would create a more reliable affordable and
clean local energy system”. NOTE 1

Our
first big accomplishment toward this goal which was to get as many individuals
as possible from each of the 117 Minneapolis precincts to commit to reading the
resolution at their precinct caucuses on the night of April 16th,
2013.

Only after this particular was in full swing
did we find out that it was not customary to advance caucus resolutions on odd
numbered years and that we might cause some confusion on caucus night.

On the night of April 16th, there
were indeed mixed results from the precinct caucuses about whether resolutions
were allowed to be read or voted upon in odd numbered years, or whether there
was even a vehicle to advance a resolution that was read and voted on.

According to the correct interpretation of the
rules that were not universally understood, precinct chairs were supposed to at
least allow the attendees to vote on whether to allow votes on resolutions. But
amid this somewhat frustrating confusion, there was a remarkable result of
momentum-building success. The Minneapolis Energy Options resolution was passed
at a rate of 100% at every last precinct where it was allowed to be read and
voted upon. There was no precinct where an attendee got a chance to read the
resolution and saw it get voted it down.

Because of these overwhelmingly positive
results, the Minneapolis Energy Options resolution was eventually given that
much-desired avenue to be introduced at the City DFL convention. We needed
petition signatures from at least 10% of the city delegates which call for the
Minneapolis Energy Options resolution to be introduced at the convention and
voted upon.

With the help of some last minute organizing
on the morning of the city convention, Minneapolis Energy Options ended up
receiving far more than the 10% of all delegate signatures required. Close to 4
months of organizing work all came to a head with 2 voice votes among delegates
at the City DFL convention on June 15th, 2013. The convention chairs
allowed 3 statements to be made in favor of the resolution and 3 statements to
be made in opposition to the resolution. One of the statements made in
opposition to the resolution was nothing more than an opinion that we should
not be reading resolutions at all in a city convention. When the moment came
for the big voice vote, it was not unanimous but the convention chair declared
that the ayes for the Minneapolis Energy Options resolution were far enough
over the winning threshold of 60% support to where a hand count was not
necessary. A second voice vote was
called by one of the co-chairs just to make sure.

Winning the DFL endorsement on June 15th
was seen as a big strategic victory for Minneapolis Energy Options. It was not
a ballot initiative yet and the convention chair made that clear. But if it had
become a ballot initiative there would have been a “vote yes on Minneapolis
Energy Options” printed on the sample ballots that the DFL distributes widely
to Minneapolis voters. This would have been a goldmine of free advertising for
a campaign that was quite cash-strapped in comparison to Xcel. A DFL sample ballot that is distributed
widely to Minneapolis voters would provide the campaign a key counterweight to
the corporate advertising blitz Xcel and/or Centerpoint would be expected to
generate in opposition to the initiative.

That
is why the day after the DFL convention, Xcel started sending emails to
neighborhood organizations saying they will send representatives to
neighborhood meetings where Minneapolis Energy Options would be presenting and
seeking endorsements from. That was the moment which Xcel made the abrupt
change from underestimating the campaign to overestimating the campaign. From
mid-June to Mid-August Xcel Energy sent spokespeople to every neighborhood
organization meeting they could for the purpose of blocking endorsements. This
resulted in joint (back to back) Minneapolis Energy Options and Xcel
presentations in some neighborhood meetings.

Xcel
could not get any neighborhoods to endorse a no vote for Minneapolis Energy
Options but Xcel’s presentation probably did block some pro-Minneapolis Energy
Options endorsements in some neighborhoods that would have otherwise done so.
The main messaging that Xcel used in their brief counter campaign was to
misrepresent the ballot initiative as a vote to jump straight to forming a
municipal utility, to say this municipalization would cost the city billions
and that it is unnecessary in the first place because Xcel is already a
national leader on clean energy.

These
strategic victories of multiple candidate endorsements, the Minneapolis DFL
endorsement, numerous neighborhood organization endorsements, and hundreds of
citizen-signed Minneapolis Energy Options signed petition cards sent to City Council
members all helped build momentum in time for the most critical and
consequential phase of the Minneapolis Energy Options campaign. It was the city
council actually taking a first set of votes to advance the issue.

This
momentum culminated in City Council voting 9-4 on June 27th and 10-3
on June 28th in favor of setting August 1st, 2013 as the
date for the public hearing (required by state law) on whether to put the
Minneapolis Energy Options resolution on the ballot.

When the public hearing was set, the Minneapolis Energy Options
resolution went from being perceived of as a marginal, out-of-reach idea to big
deal for Minneapolis. Much of the credit for making Minneapolis Energy Options
into a big deal actually goes to Centerpoint and Xcel. But those two utilities
both took two very different approaches.

As soon as the Minneapolis City Council
voted to hold this public hearing, Centerpoint called up the campaign and asked
to make a deal.They offered to come to an agreement to
meet Minneapolis Energy Option’s goals if the campaign ceases all efforts to
pursue a municipal natural gas utility. That was quite fascinating to see!
George Crocker with the North American Water Office in particular had been
working for close to 40 years to get the utilities to move on the environmental
goals Minneapolis Energy Options would be working for. Just after just this one
vote to hold a public hearing, (which was so many multiple steps removed from
forming a municipal utility in the first place) a major utility called up a “scrappy”
campaign office with an active interest in negotiating.

These calls would eventually result in a historic Memorandum of
Understanding (MOU) signed on July 23rd, 2013 where Minneapolis
Energy Options agreed to not pursue a Municipal Gas utility in exchange for
Centerpoint agreeing to meet mutual goals with Minneapolis Energy Options. The MOU also effectively took the
focus off of Centerpoint for the August 1st public hearing.

Upon
the signing of the MOU, division vice president of regional gas operations for
CenterPoint Energy, Joe Vortherms announced “We are pleased to have found
common ground with MEO,” said “Our shared goal is to advance Minneapolis’
standing as a leading city on sustainability and energy conservation. We
believe MEO’s focus on local and sustainable energy practices complements our
Conservation Improvement Programs. Together, we can help the city reach its
energy goals.” NOTE 1

The MOU laid out ways for Centerpoint to
expand its Conservation Improvement Programs (“CIP”) such as offering on-bill
loan-repayment option for residential customers who make energy efficiency
investments. The MOU also contained Centerpoint making a commitment to equity
and diversity in employment.

On some levels, the core negotiating group
within Minneapolis Energy Options had hesitations about doing the MOU and was
not certain that it would be a benefit. The Centerpoint MOU would not really
have teeth since it’s an agreement with the campaign rather than the city.
However, reaching the MOU was essential to the campaign at that point to
demonstrate we were serious about winning historic deals with moving utilities
in our direction and to prevent a second utility launching a counter campaign
if the ballot initiative materializes.

The negotiations started with Centerpoint asking us to identify
natural gas as a climate solution, but the MOU ended up with Centerpoint now
agreeing to ask their suppliers to report on methane leakage due to its climate
threat.

This most groundbreaking condition of the MOU is for
Centerpoint to “annually inquire of its Minnesota natural gas suppliers what
information they can provide regarding efforts to reduce methane leakage” and
to “Report to the City efforts to address methane leakage from its distribution
system on an annual basis, along with estimates of leakage and methodologies
used to derive those estimates.” NOTE 2
Accessible citation needed

That is unprecedented for a gas utility. If methane leakage is as
low as 4% it cancels out the climate benefits of displacing coal with natural
gas.

Centerpoint also agreed to engage
proactively in other strategies for reducing climate impact, such as Combined Heat and Power, solar thermal and
biogas, upon the recognition that
methane is a more potent greenhouse gas relative to carbon dioxide.Centerpoint
is also doing a pilot project on feeding organic methane into their pipelines.